


I Will Love You, Even When Loving You Is Hard

by hpfreak123q



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-10
Updated: 2014-10-10
Packaged: 2018-02-20 15:19:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2433527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hpfreak123q/pseuds/hpfreak123q
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Emma and Killian just shared True Love's Kiss, breaking some curse they had been under, and now Emma is avoiding him all over again. Her mother thinks she should embrace it, but sometimes it just isn't that easy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Will Love You, Even When Loving You Is Hard

Surprisingly, to the Charmings, they woke up late.  
When Mary Margaret checked the time on their clock, it read 10:30am.  
“David,” she whispered.  
“Yes?”  
“Neal slept through the night!”  
Her husband gave a sigh of relief, “Finally.”  
They both got up and donned their housecoats, intending to creep out into the living area of the loft they shared with their daughter and grandson.  
They found Emma sitting at the bar, reaching for the maple syrup she had set out. They both looked around for the pirate that surely could not be far.  
“Emma,” Mary Margaret said in surprise when she couldn't see the other man.  
She looked up and gave a bit of a smile to her mother.  
“Hey sleepyheads,” Emma replied. “Looks like my little brother finally slept through the night.”  
“Where's Henry?” Mary Margaret hedged.  
“Oh,” Emma replied swallowing her bite of cold pancake. “He's already at school. I sent him off earlier.”  
“Where's Hook?” David asked, trying to be subtle.  
“Don't know,” Emma replied, suddenly concentrating hard on making the last of the pancakes disappear into her stomach.  
Her parents exchanged a look.  
“We thought he'd be here this morning. Did he leave when you sent Henry to school?” Mary Margaret asked.  
“No.”  
David raised his eyebrows.  
“Did...he even stay the night?” he asked.  
Emma sent him a look.  
“Why would you think that?” she asked.  
“You shared true loves kiss! I don't see what all the fuss is about,” said Mary Margaret with a huff.  
“Because!” Emma replied, throwing her hands up frustratedly, suddenly very angry. “I can't just let it rule my life! I have other things to take into consideration. What about Henry? And since when are /you guys/ so supportive of Hook and me?”  
“Since you finally have a foolproof way to know that you can have a happy ending!” Mary Margaret cried.  
Emma gave a largely unladylike snort to her mother's words.  
“Happy ending, like you and David? Because if that's what happy endings are I don't want it! I don't want to have to fight for what I have from ogres and evil queens every freaking day!”  
“Emma!” David said sharply.  
Her younger brother began crying from his bassinet. She watched Mary Margaret walk over to him.  
She looked hurt as she picked up her now waking son, “Emma....” she said with a sorrowful tone.  
Emma put both hands to her face to wipe frustratedly.  
“I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that,” she relented. “It's just...I just want my son. I don't need anything else distracting me from him. It's a full time job, keeping him and the rest of this town safe.”  
“It's okay. We just want whatever makes you happy,” David told her.  
“I need to go for a walk,” Emma said as she stood. She walked towards the door of the loft and grabbed her red leather jacket from its place on the coat rack.  
“Be careful,” was all she heard before walking blindly out the door and heading for the woods.

And that is where Killian found her, wandering about in the woods.  
“Your parents told me I might find you here. Hello, love,” he said cheerfully.  
Emma visibly cringed.  
He cocked an eyebrow at her, “Something the matter?”  
“No,” she lied.  
He gave a ghost of a smile, “Princess, you may be able to tell when someone is lying, but you yourself are a terrible liar.”  
“So?”  
“So, I think you should tell me what's bothering you.”  
Emma was silent for a while, before she gave a huff and turned towards him, “I can't do this.”  
His eyebrows furrowed in confusion, “Do what?”  
“This,” she said waving her hand in between them. “What ever this is.”  
“Ahh, any reason why not?”  
“Because,” she replied stubbornly.  
“Because....?”  
“You're....” Emma said puffing up, casting her gaze anywhere but at him.  
“I'm...?”  
“You're a....a...” Emma struggled for words.  
“I'm a what?” Killian replied popping his t in a frustrated manner, expecting her to tell him that a princess like herself could never be with a pirate, “Go on, say it!”  
“You're a storybook character!” Emma blurted as she looked him in the eyes.  
There was a beat of stunned silence.  
“What?” He appeared taken aback.  
“You're Captain Hook!” her hands flailed towards him almost angrily, “From stories that I used to get read to at my foster homes. A pirate made up to scare me and little kids like me. You....aren't supposed to be real! Finding out my parents are Snow White and freaking Prince Charming is one thing, that's a hallucination I can deal with. Every little orphan girl dreams of being royalty. But this? No no no, I can't...”  
Killian looked at her with an unreadable face, “You think I'm not real?”  
“No,” Emma said frustratedly, her eyes cast downward. “You're real, it's just...”  
He grabbed her hand gently, almost as if he were afraid to scare her off,”Emma.”  
She looked at him with something akin to fear in her eyes. “What?”  
He gently placed her hand on his chest, moving her fingers a few inches beneath the leather of his vest. His heart beat strong and steady beneath her palm, his skin soft and warm to her touch.  
“Does this feel real?” he asked, his face still inscrutable.  
Tears started to well in Emma's eyes.  
“Yes,” she choked out.  
“Then, I think, my dear princess, this has to do with something entirely different,” he said softly.  
She looked away, trying to hide the tears that were burning her eyes. His hand that still lay softly over hers on his chest, moved slightly, trying to caress some semblance of calm back into her.  
She whispered, “I...”  
“I think it's because you don't scare me, Swan,” he told her, his voice vibrating through her fingertips, straight to her heart.  
“What do you mean?”  
“I think it's because when you put up your walls, when you avoid me, and even when you run away, I know what you're doing. And I read the signs like you're an open book,” He stepped closer to her, and leaned in close to her. “Emma, I think its because you don't believe a lost girl like yourself deserves what your parents have.”  
She covered her mouth with her other hand trying to stifle a sob. How he could see right through her every time she spoke, she would never know.  
“You think because we shared a moment of shared vulnerability, that I'll find some reason to leave you, like others have in the past. You think that no one could really love an orphan like you the way I do.”  
Emma bowed her head, almost ashamed of the truth in his words.  
He tilted his to look into her eyes, “Emma Swan, I do love you. I love you so much I traded my home for you. I love you so much that the purest magic that can break any curse, came from our kiss.”  
“How can you? How can I...Why wasn't it scary like this when I was with Neal? Or Walsh? Or even Graham?” she asked, the hand not beneath his falling to her side again.  
He fell silent at her question, then wrapped his left arm around her shoulder, sandwiching their hands between their bodies, still placed over his heart. She buried her face into his chest, trying to hide. He breathed in deeply, and drew strength from her scent.  
“Because, I think it wasn't true love. Just as it wasn't true love with my Milah. Yes, we loved them, we always will, and no one will ever be able to replace them. But I think, this is different. There are many types of love in this, and many other worlds, lass,” he replied sagely. “I think ours is powerful in ways that others are not. Then again, other loves can be more powerful in different ways. For example, your love for your boy is powerful in ways that the love we share is not. My love for you was powerful in ways that I loved my ship was not.”  
It sounded like a jumbled explanation from him, but somehow it just made sense. She calmed slightly, taking deep breaths, breathing in his scent of leather, rum, and the sea.  
“So, are you trying to say the love we share is...cosmic?” she asked.  
He exhaled sharply, something that almost sounded like a laugh from him, “Perhaps the better word to use here is magic.”  
Emma tried to keep the smile that was slowly creeping up, off her face.  
She felt him lay a kiss on the crown of her head, and tighten his hold on her briefly.  
There was several moments of silence between them. The only sounds to be heard were the ones of the forest, the sound of Killian's heartbeat beneath her fingers, and deep breaths that they were both taking.  
“I'm still not going to be good at this,” she said, abruptly looking up at him.  
He smiled faintly, “No need to be. It'll be a journey we can take together, as slow or as quickly as you need.”  
“I still don't think I deserve you.”  
A genuine smile unfurled on his face, “Nor will I ever deserve you, my love.”  
She snorted.  
“Is that a smile I see?” he asked.  
“No,” she said petulantly, a smile appearing on her face anyways.  
“I think it was,” he grinned.  
She grinned back, "You're an idiot."  
He still felt the smile on her lips when he kissed her.  
"Next time you doubt how real I am, just come to my bedchamber," he winked at her after they came up for air. His fingers tapped on hers, reminding her where hers still lay.  
She pulled her hand away from his reluctantly, instantly regretting the loss.  
“I think....I think I need to go apologize to Mary....my mom and dad,” she said.  
“Aye, I think that would be prudent,” he replied ruefully.  
Emma raised an eyebrow at him, “How would you know?”  
“When I spoke with them earlier, they seemed rather distraught about you for some reason, and apparently, you upset the Lady Snow very much with something you had said.”  
She groaned. Her and her big mouth, she thought.  
“Not to worry, love. I'm sure they just want to know you're alright.”  
“What do we tell them though?”  
His eyebrows furrowed lightly, “What do you mean?”  
“What do we tell them about us?”  
“What ever you'd like.”  
“I think we should tell them that we're still taking things slow. And Henry should be a part of any more major decision making,” she added.  
He gave her a mischievous grin, “Why, Swan, are you already thinking of chaining me to you for the rest of your life?”  
“I need to keep you right where you belong.”  
“Where is that, my dear?”  
“Next to me. How else will I make sure you stay out of trouble?”  
He laughed, “Ah my love, but where is the fun in that?”  
She looked at him with a smile on her face, “I guess we'll have to make our own fun then.”  
“Aye, lass, that we will.”


End file.
